Top coral scientists named on prestigious ‘highly cited’ list

Six scientists from the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies (Coral CoE) were this week announced as Highly Cited Researchers for 2019 by Clarivate Analytics’ Web of Science Group.

The elite list is part of a worldwide survey on the impact of academic work. Highly Cited Researchers rank in the top one percent by citations for their field.

The scientists are also chosen for making an impact in solving the world’s biggest challenges.

Coral CoE is recognised as the world’s foremost authority on coral reef science and is a global hub for world-leading research.

The Coral CoE scientists announced as Highly Cited Researchers are based at the James Cook University (JCU) and University of Queensland nodes of the Centre:

• Professor Terry Hughes, Director of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies. His research focuses on the linkages between the ecology of reefs and their importance for societies and economies.

• Professor Geoff Jones, who focuses on larval dispersal and population connectivity in marine fish populations; marine conservation biology and the effective design of marine reserve networks; and the responses of coral reef fishes to changes in habitat structure.

• Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, Deputy Director of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies. He is focussed on finding high-impact solutions to address several of the most pressing and serious challenges facing humanity worldwide: climate change, food security, clean energy and population growth.

• Professor Morgan Pratchett, whose current research focuses on major disturbances that impact coral reef ecosystems, with a view to understanding differential responses and vulnerabilities among coral reef organisms.

• Professor Philip Munday, whose primary research focuses on understanding and predicting the impacts that climate change will have on populations and communities of marine fishes, both directly through changes in the physical environment and indirectly through effects on coral reef habitat.

• Professor John Pandolfi, a marine palaeoecologist focussing on anthropogenic impacts and climate change on the recent past history of modern coral reefs. His research on the ecology of the Great Barrier Reef and reefs globally provides insight into how past marine ecosystems function in the absence of humans, providing reef managers with important historical context.

Around 6,200 researchers were named on the Web of Science list this year.
More information at: https://publons.com/awards/highly-cited/2019/